livin' the high life with bay scallops

Guide to Living the High Life, featuring Bay Scallops 
by Dora

Today's post will feature an incredibly simple and affordable, 5 minute recipe that will guarantee to transform your soon-to-expire $5 bag of frozen Bay scallops into a Michelin star-worthy meal.

Ingredients
Bay scallops, a handful
Wheat bread, 1 slice
Salt, to taste
Garlic, thinly sliced
Oil, for cooking
Optional: lemon juice, for that extra fancy feeling


1. Oil a pan over med-high heat.

2. When the oil is very hot, throw a handful of scallops in. Let the scallops sit there. Relish in that sizzle.

3. After a minute, toss in the garlic. Stir the scallops and the garlic together until the scallops are less transparent.

4. After the scallops begin to turn opaque, take the pan off the heat. Stir in the seasonings (salt, pepper, whatever) and a spoonful of lemon juice. You won't be able to taste the lemon juice, but you'll know it's there. And hey, that knowledge should make you feel extra fancy.

5. When the scallops are ready, pour them dramatically out of the pan and onto a non-paper plate, making sure that some fall off of the toast, to the side of the toast, around the toast, but mostly on the toast. Smother the toast just enough to ensure that no one can tell that the toast underneath is actually just a piece of toast.

Faux-tography Tip: "The Corner Close-up" is one of my favorite methods for capturing food in the most appealing way. Just point your camera at a random corner of your subject, zoom-in real close and snap! It's as easy as that. For the best "scallop on toast" photo, I recommend trying for a 5:4:1 ratio of scallop:plate:toast. 

6. Re-position any scallops on the toast and/or plate, if necessary, to maximize the aesthetic.

7. Stand back and admire your hard work.

8. Pull out your phone and Instagram your masterpiece. Keep rotating your phone until you have found the best perspective that embodies the perfect visual ratio of scallop-toast-plate-table (4:1:2:3). If necessary, filter.

9. When you have finally finished Snapchatting photos to your friends and colleagues, and your scallops and toast have turned cold, eat.

Enjoy!

Additional recommendations:

• Substitute or add the following ingredients for increased feelings of self-satisfaction : extra virgin olive oil, anything with "French" in its name, a sprig of mint

New England winter, redefined

As of yesterday, the Boston Globe reports that after snowstorm Neptune generously gifted us yet another foot of snow, February 2015's snowfall is officially one for the books, breaking the city's record with an incredible 58.5 inches of snow dropped in one month.

For now, a hulking expanse of snowflake and ice sits in our front and back yard - and entire neighborhood for that matter. In many areas, the snow piles come close to or already are towering above me; in our driveway, it rises above my father and even my 6-foot-something Irish neighbor. Problem is, there is just nowhere else to put it. Yet still, the forecast reads: more snow is on the way.

"Why didn't I go to school in California when I had the chance?"

The porch, covered in a sheet of ice

Man vs. snow: My father, with his trusty shovel

coco(a)nut cake

My neighbor's ice dam. Ice, damn.

Happy S.A.D. Singles Awareness Day. Or, more like: Snowing Again?! Day. 
I can't wait to comb through the chocolate sales next week, after I dig myself out of the snow because surprise! it snowed another 15 inches this weekend. This is on top of the roughly 5 feet that has already fallen in the past month.

WHEN WILL THE MADNESS END?! 

The inspiration for this cake came from my insatiable dark chocolate cravings paired with the need to use up a can of coconut milk, left over from when I made cocomisu, tiramisu's dairy-free cousin.
I threw in some coffee powder and spices to add some flavor pizzazz and because snowy wintry weather makes me want to flood my senses with things like toasted cinnamon and ginger.

Smells heavenly while baking

For as long as I could remember, we had this opened, full bag of coffee powder sitting in our fridge. But, no one in my family drinks coffee...
So when I made this chocolate cake, I scooped out a spoonful of the coffee powder, tasted it to make sure it still tasted like coffee (it did) and happily added it to the batter because coffee enhances the dark and bitter flavors of chocolate.

When I told my father (a.k.a. my loyal and often sole taste tester) that I had added coffee powder into this cake, he looked confused. He asked, Where did you get the coffee powder? I told him that it was from the bag in the fridge. That's when he laughed, and said "That coffee powder is at least 15 years old!" Turns out, "that coffee powder" is not 15, but more than 20 years old. My parents received it as a gift when they first moved to the US. Which marks its to be: at least 22 years old.

So, uh, that's cool.

Maybe this special, "aged coffee powder" is the secret ingredient to making this cake taste extra ~magical~. Or old. Or weird? Nah. Coffee powder isn't like wine or cheese, and anyhow, rest assured that the cake passed the nomnomnom test. To think that, after sitting there for 22 long years, the coffee powder was finally able to serve a purpose.

chocolate coconut cake [dairy free, vegan]
1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp coffee powder
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1/2 cup white granulated sugar
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup full-fat coconut milk (or sub 1/3 coconut oil + 1/3 coconut milk)
1/2 cup dairy-free milk, warmed (I used almond)
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
Optional recommendations: 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp ginger powder

1. Preheat oven to 350, In a bowl, combine 1/2 cup coconut milk and vanilla extract.
2. In a separate bowl, heat up 1/2 cup dairy-free milk with the coffee powder in a microwave until the coffee powder dissolves. Add this to the coconut milk and vanilla mixture.
3. Add the granulated sugar and mix until dissolved.
4. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, salt and cocoa powder.
5. Slowly and thoroughly incorporate the dry mixture into the wet mixture, either by hand or mixer, until there are no dry patches left.
6. Pour batter into greased pan. Bake at 350 for 35-40 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean.

Dairy free tiramisu? cocomisu!

omnomnomnom

Have you ever heard of an accidental tiramisu? Well, this is kind of what this is.

This is the story of how my dreams of a poofy sponge cake were thwarted by a clumpy, egg yolky and over-mixed batter which, with some perseverance, transformed into a 100% dairy free tiramisu. Or, as my suitemate Anna coined it: a cocomisu.

With a bowl of funky cake batter in front of me, all I can say is, it was too far to turn back. While I was tempted to start over, I never throw food away unless I can see and smell the mold, per se. So I popped it into the oven and crossed my fingers that the baking gods would have mercy on my n00b skillz. Lo and behold, the cake turned out fine, albeit it was as flat as a pancake! No surprise there. It had a nice egg-y flavor and a pretty golden color. Kind of like, you know, a lady finger. See what I'm getting at? [as a side note, isn't "lady fingers" such a gross name for something that you eat?]

I am dairy free! woohoo